Springing about

No, not me - I don't seem to have much spring about me these days! But this lovely weather and the strangeness of my Tuesdays saw us getting out at midday (there was already a load of washing on the line) because my back hurt too much when I was sitting down so I couldn't do any of the online stuff I had in mind. Instead, we took ourselves off to Benmore Gardens, once more open for the season and therefore busier than we've seen it for a while. 

The wonderful thing about a garden like Benmore is that very few of the bus-parties that visit ever get above the level of the riverside bit of the gardens. We always head up a fairly hidden little path, through the Japanese garden (or is it Chinese?) and on up to the Andean refuge among the monkey-puzzle trees at the top of the hill. We met one man, enjoying a quiet picnic in the shelter, and after a few exchanges saw no-one else until we were almost back at the gates. It was just after we'd left him to his lunch that we saw a fairly large deer loping across our path and over the mossy hillside without even looking at us, followed a little later by the much smaller chap (I think) in my photo. We weren't talking at the time, and he didn't seem at all rattled by our presence, turning round ever so often as if to see what we were doing. This above is the moment he posed for me before finally leaping off after the big fellow.

All this left me feeling very content (for a change!) as we headed down among the various flowerings of the early rhododendrons, a woodpecker drumming distantly below us. And this evening's choir practice has also left a good feeling: we started in some dismay because three (out of eight) singers were missing for a variety of reasons and we have a gig in under a fortnight, but we sang so well that the first piece had us all grinning by the end. (That feeling when an unaccompanied piece finishes bang in tune ...) 

I've just been reading a story in today's Scotsman about journalists being helped out of Mariupol before the Russians could find them and use them to make videos "confessing" their stories had all been lies. I'm glad it's too late this evening for me to watch the news tonight ...

And that feels like cowardice.